Justice Department to Create New Position to Coordinate Domestic Terrorism Investigations

The new Counsel will serve as a central point of contact for U.S. Attorneys around the nation, working with them to identify trends across cases, shape strategy, and analyze legal gaps that need to be addressed, the AP reports.

The creation of the new Counsel position was announced this week by Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Carlin following a George Washington University speech.

"We need to make sure we have the mechanisms in place so that we can continue to remain just as focused on the domestic terrorism threat while addressing the international terrorism threat," Carlin stated.

Carlin’s wide-ranging remarks on domestic terrorism were delivered to an event cosponsored by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and the George Washington University Center for Cyber and Homeland Security’s Program on Extremism.

Carlin noted that while the often public focuses on violent extremism in other areas of the world, for example inspired by Al Qaeda and the Islamic State, “violent extremism is neither a new phenomenon, nor one that is limited to any single population, region or ideology,” and that individuals in America continue to be “motivated by anti-government animus, to eco-radicalism, to racism, as it has for decades.”

He provided the example of two New York women, inspired by violent Islamic ideology, who were charged with conspiring to build a bomb and conduct an attack in the United States.

Subscribe!

This Week on FEDtalk

Tune in to FEDtalk this week for a discussion on the importance of cybersecurity within the federal government. As the federal government becomes increasingly digital, it also becomes increasingly at risk for cyberattacks. Experts in the cybersecurity community will discuss what these threats look like and how the federal workforce can prepare for them.

Hear it from FLEOA

Nathan Catura, President of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association (FLEOA), the nation’s largest non-partisan, not-for-profit professional association representing more than 27,000 federal law enforcement officers and agents across 65 federal agencies, today issued the following statement in support of the EAGLES Act.